Coal-fired power plants are the single largest source of mercury pollution in the United States. Emissions from these plants eventually make their way into Michigan’s waterways, contaminating fish and wildlife.

Parents in Michigan shouldn't have to worry that their children's bodies are toxic dumping grounds. The Environmental Protection Agency is moving forward to protect children's health from toxic mercury pollution, and we can't let big polluters stand in the way.

This report ranks cities in Michigan and across the country for the number of days when the air was unhealthy to breathe due to smog pollution last year and this summer, and includes new data showing that the problem is even worse than the public thought. The research shows that on six additional days last year, Detroit-area residents were exposed to smog levels that a national scientific panel has found to be dangerous to breathe. Yet, because of outdated federal air quality rules, those at risk were never alerted to unhealthy air levels.

When power plants burn coal, oil or gas, they create the ingredients for ground-level ozone pollution, one of the main components of “smog” pollution. Especially on hot summer days, across wide areas of the United States, ozone pollution reaches levels that are unhealthy to breathe, putting our lives at risk. In 2009, U.S. power plants emitted more than 1.9 million tons of ozone-forming nitrogen oxide pollution into the air.